Broken heroes
A/N: just before we begin I wanted to say something… guys the impostor is Ramiel I saw him vent
Chapter 9: your son looks as good as an angel (part 1)
"What the fuck?" the trio inside the Atlan shouted as the video feed of the camera inside the Slayer's room reached the screen.
Inside the room there was a blue flying geometric shape that looked like the fifth angel, but way smaller.
As everyone continued to watch various questions formed in their minds "how is Ramiel alive?" "how the fuck did it survive the impact?", but most importantly the Slayer thought "what is he doing in my room?".
Then suddenly, the small angel started moving through the air and as it descended, it approached the shelves where the Slayer kept his toys.
It then started to use it's At field, which could be seen moving the various toys out of their assigned places, it placed some of them on the floor while others were kept in the air.
Finally, it got a hold of the mini Slayer and after placing it near the group of demons on the floor, then it started to move all the toys at the same time and he appeared to be-
"is he playing with them?" Asked Mari, who in the meantime had reached the geofront together with the Atlan and the other units.
"looks like it, what shall we do? " replied Misato from the command room.
Then the commander said "we eliminate it taking advantage of its weakened state"
"for once i agree with you" said Hayden who then continued "Slayer, you are the closest one, try to make contact with it"
"ok" the man said and so he deactivated the giant robot outside of the ship and jumped down, but as soon as one of the doors opened, the angel screamed in fear and after putting the toys back at an alarming speed, it escaped through the vent it had come from.
Moments later the Slayer entered his room, but he found nothing inside except for an open air vent.
The conducts were too small for him to fit through so for now he was stuck with an angel roaming around and no way to reach it.
But then his eyes fell on the corner of the room where the mini Atlan Hayden had printed was resting motionless and he picked it up.
Seeing this Hayden said "do you want to use the mini Atlan?" "I believe it's our only option here since none of us fits in the air conducts"
"Then wait a bit, I'm coming over, it will be easier if I take control of it".
Samuel then quickly teleported into the fortress and made his way to the Slayer's room.
He then connected to the green toy and after the man placed him in the vents, he activated the light and asked "ok, VEGA do you know where it went?"
"No, it looks like it is able to avoid detection in some way, but it seems to have left a trail in front of you when it ran away"
"ok, the adventure begins"
And so Hayden started following the trail and while he was walking he said to break the silence "you know, I was thinking that something strange was happening in the fortress.
Sometimes I found the toys lying around in strange places and other times there were strange noises during the night, but I never thought that we had an angel in here"
Then the Slayer said "I'm still trying to figure out how he survived the impact, we collided dead centre"
And so Ritsuko replied "the only reasonable explanation is that the core somehow remained intact, thus keeping the angel alive.
It should be our primary target, what armament do you have in that thing?"
"only a small taser, I didn't exactly think we would ever have to use this in combat"
"we'll manage, since when do you think that it has started moving?"
"if I remember correctly I found a toy in my room the day before VEGA came back"
But then Ayanami added "I believe that it goes much further than that as I remember that I felt being watched at one point during the first bath I took in your internal pool"
And so Mari said "Ohh, it looks like we have a naughty angel, spying on us with swimsuits on"
When Hayden heard this he thought "thank God she left out that detail, wait did I just hear something?"
"Did you hear that? It sounded like a chant, it must be close, where am I now VEGA?"
"you are over the unmaykr room, still no signs of the angel, but if you keep going this way there is a larger area up ahead"
Then suddenly something was thrown from behind the Atlan, hitting it lightly on the back.
Hayden immediately turned around and he only caught a glimpse of a blue mass turning a corner away from him, screaming in the meantime.
He didn't have time to fire, so he lowered the taser and looked down at what the angel had just used.
It was a small rock with some incisions on it, that read "Play?"
"What the?"
Then VEGA said "it looks like the same type of rock that makes up the demon prison, he must have taken it from there, now for the message…
Could it be that its intentions are not malicious?"
As VEGA said that, from behind the corner where the angel had escaped, a small colorful beach ball came out and so the Slayer said "so that's where it was, huh"
"should we try to communicate with it?" asked Hayden and then Misato replied
"I think that we should give it a go.
It hasn't shown any hostility towards us so far, but I don't want another situation like mount Asama so be careful"
"Ok then, here we go" and so the toy robot moved forward towards the corner.
As Hayden marched forward, Ramiel could be heard retreating further into the vent, still fearing any sort of interaction with the outside world.
Once Samuel reached the ball, he looked at his right and he saw Ramiel waiting behind a corner.
The Atlan then kicked the small ball in the angel's direction, making it stop right in front of him.
At this moment Ramiel wasn't sure what to do.
He could escape from the potentially dangerous toy as he still couldn't defend himself because of the damage to his core.
Or he could kick the ball back and see if the new being he had met wanted to play with him.
After some thinking, he went out of the corner and approached the ball.
He noticed that the toy recoiled a bit when he revealed himself, but he thought that he was just surprised.
Ramiel then pushed the ball back with his weak At field and once he saw the toy pick it up, he screamed in happiness for finally having found a friend to play with.
Meanwhile everyone was watching the exchange and they were simply confused by it.
After all they had always known that angels were ruthless killers that didn't want nothing more than to cause the death of humanity by bringing about the third impact.
"So why was it behaving like an innocent child?" VEGA thought "could it be that there is more to the angels than what we know? And now that I think about it… Could I have dreamed about him back in Urdak?"
Those questions though would be left for another time, right now,
they had to play ball with Ramiel.
Still in the vents, a couple of minutes later
The play session had been going on for a while now and Ramiel was heard having lots of fun, but at one point, tired of their activity Hayden opened the speaker in the toy and asked "can you understand me?"
The angel of course was shook by this as up until now his friend had remained silent.
Ramiel then tried to reply in his own language, but after seeing a lack of response, he understood that they didn't understand him so he tried another thing.
He opened a small hole in one of his corners and then he turned to face the side of the vent.
Ramiel then fired a small laser that left marks on the steel.
Those marks turned out to be letters in the Kanji alphabet which read
"can understand, need some mass to speak, help find mass?"
"do we accept?" asked Hayden to the rest of the crew without being heard by Ramiel and then Ritsuko said "I believe that we should, he seems to be acting friendly enough, plus he just needs some mass not all of it.
So he would still be weakened if he tried to attack us"
"Okay Ramiel, we're helping you, VEGA do you know if you can find any of that mass?"
But then some noises from the angel distracted Hayden and when he turned around Ramiel started to proceed towards the larger area VEGA had pointed out earlier.
He understood that the angel already knew where this mass was, but he couldn't reach it.
Or at least, that's what he made of those noises mixed with chants.
Fortress of Doom, Slayer's room
"Hey guys? How's it going? Still following our new friend? Nya?" said Mari as she entered the Slayer's room together with the other pilots.
Then Asuka added "you talk about him as if he didn't try to kill us all a couple of months ago"
"I'm pretty forgiving, nya! Also, am I the only one who finds him pretty cute?"
"...You certainly have some strange interests Makinami"
"I know, nya" she said after taking Ayanami's hand, making the girl blush, as she always did.
Then the silence was broken by the Slayer who said "what are we going to do with him once he can talk?" and Asuka replied "I don't know, interrogate him, probably and then we'll see, although I think that he is going to be killed after"
"Not if he acts like this"
"What do you mean? He's an angel"
"Yes, but he has put our trust in us to help him.
He has also changed, he would have never done all of this if he was still the thing that attacked you when I arrived.
So right now I suppose that we give him a chance, I don't want to betray his feelings"
When Hayden and VEGA heard that word, pronounced in that way, they immediately understood that the man was being serious about this.
And if they had to be honest, they didn't want to kill him too, especially VEGA, who was looking forward to having a talk with him.
But, now they had to focus, so they left that thought for later.
Moments after, Hayden reached the larger area VEGA had talked about with Ramiel, when suddenly the angel moved to the side to cover a corner, almost as if there was something there that he didn't want others to see.
And so Hayden asked "Ramiel? What are you doing? Are you hiding something?"
As the toy tried to step closer though, a hostile cry was heard coming from the blue angel, who took a more defensive stance, but in doing so, he revealed what he was hiding.
"That's his core and… it's badly damaged, he must be in pain" said VEGA who then added "try to make him let us have a look at it Samuel"
"it's easier said than done, he is extremely fragile at the moment after all and after all this time, I doubt that he wants someone to touch what has been keeping him alive for so long…
Nevertheless I'll try something… (speakers on) now Ramiel, please calm down, I'm not going to hurt you, so please don't shoot at me,I just want to help you, so please let me have a look at your core"
Tension filled the next seconds, in which the angel was questioning whether he should let him do that or not, but since he had been friendly until now, he trusted the strange toy enough to let him proceed.
What everyone saw then was a red sphere, almost as big as Ramiel that had a blanket over it.
The most prominent detail though, was the crack that had opened in one of the sides that even if it wasn't that deep, it still was enough to make someone wonder if it had been a miracle to have saved the angel.
"I'm not an expert in angel medicine, but I believe that the core isn't in a good condition" said Akagi, to which Misato replied "the sun has risen today"
After a grunt of annoyance the scientist asked "so, commander,how do you reckon we proceed?"
And after a bit came Ikari's response "while in the beginning I was of the opinion of terminating the angel, the situation has changed and now what we are presented with is the possibility of gaining a powerful ally and so more information on the angels in general.
I say that we proceed with assisting the fifth angel"
And so Akagi said "understood.
Hayden, do you have a way of providing more light so that we can have a better look at the core?"
"No, the internal lights of the Atlan only provide this much, oops I left the speakers on"
This error from Samuel though, caused an unexpected reaction from the angel, who, after hearing what he had said, moved towards another corner of the room and extended a spike from one of his sides.
Hayden turned to watch what Ramiel was doing, when suddenly his vision was filled with light.
After a couple of seconds of adjusting the camera though, he was able to see again and from that he realized something.
He wasn't just in a larger area of the ventilation network, he was in Ramiel's room.
The whole place resembled a scene out of WALL-E, there was random stuff lying around, some other things put in a box a small pillow and finally a small lamp that was illuminating everything.
"This guy definitely has some personality"
Said Mari, holding back her laughter.
Then Misato said from the command room "oh my God, I… Rits?..."
"I'm as stunned as you Misato"
"if you would like ladies, I'll talk with him" said Hayden in almost a mocking manner and after turning on the microphone once more he said to Ramiel:
"quite a nice place you've got here, did you make it yourself?"
The angel nodded and then he went into the box to go and grab something.
He then came out with a pair of cat ears that he put on himself and the Atlan while making happy noises.
At this moment Mari couldn't take it no more and she burst into laughter and said almost shouting "Ahahahahah, so that's where they were, this Ramiel guy is fantastic, can we keep him Misato, pleaase? Nya?"
"Woah hold on a second, we still don't know if he really is on our side or not, he tried to kill us after all"
But then Hayden said "let's check that… hey Ramiel did you want to kill everyone in Tokyo 3 when you first arrived?"
The angel then shook his body horizontally, signaling a "no".
"then why did you attack unit 01? And 00?"
This time, the angel reopened his structure to use the laser again and right as he started firing, Hayden noticed the core getting a bit brighter.
When he was finished the sign read "fear"
"Wait, you are scared of the Evangelions?"
The angel then nodded and to this Samuel added "Well why aren't you scared of the Atlan? They are very similar after all"
The angel this time denied.
"Interesting… Hey what is happening to you?"
After he said that, Hayden noticed that the angel's core was getting much darker until it had almost turned grey.
Meanwhile Ramiel's body fell down and started emitting strange noises, each one of them sounding more tired than the last.
"what is happening!?" said Hayden with clear worry in his voice and to this Ritsuko answered "could he be having a heart attack?"
"What?"
"if we think of his core as his heart then right now the spark that is keeping it active is dying out, I don't know what we can do to help him"
Almost everyone was getting worried for the situation of the fifth angel, but after a bit Hayden said:
"A 'spark' you said?" as he opened the taser in the toy's arm Ritsuko answered "Wait, you want to electrocute him?"
"It's like you said, if the core is like a heart then this will be the same as giving him an atrial fibrillation, I don't see any other way out of this, VEGA?"
"proceed and quickly"
"here we go, in 3… 2...1…"
Bzzzt
A moment later the sphere lit up again with life and the angel's body started to float again.
Ramiel then proceeded to ram the toy Atlan into a wall.
The crew were surprised by this, but as the camera readjusted the focus and audio, what seemed like crying was heard coming from the angel.
"ok, Ramiel, calm down, you are still alive, you core is… Fine… you are still with us"
Suddenly the angel manifested his AT field and wrapped it around the toy, he then shouted "REEEEEEEEEEEE"
The cry was very, very loud, in fact everyone had to cover their ears to avoid having some serious damage, but it didn't help much.
As the sound died down though, VEGA said "it looks like he is hugging you with his AT field, I suppose returning the gesture Samuel" and the robot did so.
Meanwhile Ritsuko was thinking "since when did he start to call him Samuel? Could it be from what the Slayer told me? About VEGA being Hayden's dad, probably, I wonder how they are doing…
Maybe later, we have more important issues right now, like for example an angel behaving like a fucking human.
I mean, it could be feasible since their DNA is a 99% accurate copy of ours, but still something must have happened for him to develop this much"
As the hug finally ended Hayden said "better? Now, if you would tell me where you found your mass-"
Ramiel then immediately got up and opened one of the grates to the side.
"after you" said Hayden.
Location of a part of Ramiel's matter
After around a minute of walking, the toy Atlan and the angel reached their destination.
"So it's here? I don't see it?"
Ramiel then opened the grate under them, but as soon as he did that an entire orchestra of demon screams was heard, scaring both the angel and Hayden,who asked "VEGA, where are we?"
"right over the demon prison, I advise caution"
"g-good to know, so Ramiel, it's in there?"
The angel then nodded and so Samuel asked "Slayer, you don't mind going down there to have a look right?"
Unexpectedly, he was answered by Shinji who said "I think that he's already going there"
"I'm not surprised"
Ripatorium
"back in there once again" the Slayer thought as the elevator brought him down into the demon prison.
"it has been a while since I purged those guys down there, oh well, their truce period is over"
The gate opened and immediately all the demons turned to look at him, he didn't waste time and as he jumped down, music started to accompany his carnage.
Play:[Cultist base] Doom eternal ost
As soon as he landed, he started to get surrounded by a bunch of imps, but he dashed away from them, leaving a live grenade as a present which turned all of them into guts and blood after it exploded.
The Slayer then found himself facing a mancubus, which was about to strike with its ground shockwave, but it was stunned by a super shotgun shot which was then followed by the ray of the ballista.
He repeated this combo once more and so all that was left of the fat demon were his spine and his limbs, while the entire main body and head had been completely blown off.
Next there was the pain elemental which was floating nearby.
Who quickly found himself into the ground and dead as a barrage of homing missiles blew up his brains.
After that came some fodder demons and then the next 'big' challenge, a fire baron of hell.
It charged at the Slayer with all the strength that his gigantic muscles could muster, but he was suddenly stopped when an ice bomb flew straight into his face.
Taking the opportunity, the Slayer pulled out the minigun with the mobile turret mod active and a fraction of a second later, all the four barrels started to fill with lead and iceburns the demon's head.
As the mighty baron fell, an even greater threat spawned in… An Archvile.
Almost five meters tall and with a pretty resistant body, those fuckers were the bane of any hellwalker (that being only the Slayer).
"really? One of those bastards? I forgot that there was one in the prison, oh well time to die Archfucker"
And so the Slayer started shooting everything that he had at him, rockets, shells, plasma rays, bullets and as he launched the final grenade, he went in and glory killed the demon by first cutting his left leg, then the arm and finally making his head explode under his foot.
Once the Archvile was gone, the Slayer chainsawed a gargoyle that was flying nearby as he needed to replenish his ammo, especially for the next fight, as a marauder was waiting for him.
Moments later in fact, the centre of the arena was filled with red waves of energy and from them a marauder emerged, which quickly started to run towards the Slayer.
Doomguy would have been anxious if it wasn't for the fact that he had developed a strategy which he could use to kill them after a single combo.
And so right as the demon was swinging his argent axe to hit the Slayer, a grenade sent him off balance, which was then quickly followed by the super shotgun, then the ballista, then the super shotgun again.
By this time the demon had regained his composure, but he wasn't able to parry the rocket that was remotely detonated right next to him.
This left an opening for the Slayer, which he used to land the final super shotgun shot.
Now that the demon was staggered, the Slayer tried to punch him and end his miserable life, but the fist was blocked by the marauder who was using all of his remaining strength.
This wasn't enough though as shortly after the fist was stopped, the Doom blade came forward and impaled the fallen sentinel right through his head.
With this the fight ended and the Slayer said "The area is free, but not for long, come down quickly".
And so both the angel and the mini Atlan jumped down into the arena.
Then Misato asked from the command room "what do you mean not for long? You killed every demon in there"
"yes,but this prison has a curse in it, where the demons that are kept inside, once they die, are reincarnated, to make them suffer eternally, it always takes a while for the process to happen, but if we move quickly it won't be a problem"
"Jeez, eternal suffering? Isn't that a bit much?"
"NO
Anyway Ramiel, where is your mass anyway? I don't see it"
The angel then proceeded to point his laser against the left wall and to this the Slayer replied "behind that wall? Ok, ste-... Float back back a little"
Ramiel did so and once he was at a safe distance, the Slayer pulled out the rocket launcher and fired towards the grey stone, but the rocket collided and exploded against an energy field right before reaching its target.
"Ah right, I forgot, VEGA can you remove the internal shields?"
"done"
And so he fired again and this time, bits stone were blown off and flung around the area and after the smoke went away, it revealed a couple of blue spikes that were sticking out of the hole.
Ramiel screamed happily at the sight and flew towards them, but he was suddenly stopped in mid air by what seemed to be like an invisible string.
"What the? Are you ok?" Hayden asked, but this time he didn't get a reply.
Instead, the angel flew back up into the ventilation system and moments later he reappeared with his broken core being carried right behind him by his AT field.
"Ah so you couldn't get too far away from your core right?"
The floating being nodded and then he flew directly into the spears, which were absorbed into his body, together with the core, making him get a little bigger.
"Can you hear me now?" Ramiel finally said.
The Slayer nodded and so the angel replied "Yay!"
He had a very high pitched voice, similar to that of a child, plus there seemed to be a holy chant in the background every time he spoke,but it was almost undetectable.
"I'm happy too, but let's get out of here before the demons return" Samuel said and Ramiel replied
"okay, I didn't like their faces very much, they are ugly"
"I'm glad that we are on the same page" the Slayer added while picking up the toy Atlan and shutting it down, thus cutting the connection that they had with the command room.
"What did you do to him?"
"Oh don't worry, this was just a thing that he was using to communicate with you, right now he is waiting for us upstairs"
"Oh, okay".
The two of them got outside and moments later they were in the elevator, from where Ramiel was staring at the Atlan.
"you like it?"
"Yes, because it doesn't look like dad or mom"
"What do you mean?"
"the other ones that I saw, they all looked like dad and I didn't like it, because dad was not very good… But yours is cool"
"different from dad and mom? What does it mean? We'll have to ask his some questions for sure"
"Thank you Ramiel"
"Thank you too, for helping me with the core"
"As long as you don't try to kill us it's fine"
"There is no chance that that is going to happen, I'm not like my brothers anymore"
"My guess is that all the angels are a very big family right?"
"Yes, but we don't have the best of relationships with our parents, they were very mean at times"
"I'm sorry to hear that"
"don't worry, it's from this that we learned how to stand up for ourselves"
"Why are you and the others coming here in Tokyo 3 anyway?"
"It's because we sense that dad is near and we want to see him again after fifteen years"
"fifteen years huh? What a coincidence, isn't that right NERV?"
The man said while looking at the internal camera that VEGA was using to broadcast their conversation to the geofront and the Slayer's quarters.
"who are you talking to?"
"there are some people that are listening to us, you are a special guest after all"
"I know, being the only one of my brothers that has survived so far must be important to you right?"
"Well yes, how do you feel about the deaths of the others?"
"I can't say that I'm not sad for them, but from what I understand if one of us reaches dad then all of the lilim die, so it's normal that they would defend themselves.
But you don't feel like one, even if you are similar to them"
"It's probably because I'm not from this world, but I'm still human"
"what's a human?"
Slayer's room
As the elevator ride finally ended and the two of them entered the Slayer's room, they were met by Hayden and three of the four pilots.
"where is Ayanami?" The Slayer said and Samuel replied
"she was called back to the geofront while you were in the elevator, anyway, nice to meet you again Ramiel"
"Oh so you were the one that was talking to me… nice to see you too, Samul?"
"It's Samuel Hayden, and these are the pilots of the Evangelions, you might know them already"
"I saw two of them already, the one with the glasses and the one with the blue hair, but the other two I don't know them"
"I'm Asuka Langley Soryu, the best one, I pilot unit 02"
"and I'm Shinji Ikari pilot of unit 01"
"REEE" the angel shouted as soon as the purple Evangelion was mentioned and then he asked "you pilot that scary thing?"
"Unit 01? Scary? I mean, it isn't really kid friendly, but it's not that scary"
"You must be fearless then"
"um, no, not at all, I'm not that brave actually"
"this isn't what I learned from my brothers, are you sure you are the right person?"
"Yes?"
"then you lilim are really strange, also Asuka, Mari, can I ask you something?
are those spheres you have on your chest cores?"
Mari then started to laugh a lot while Asuka was as red and angry as she could be.
"Did I say something wrong?"
And Hayden replied "No, you didn't, anyway, I wanted to know:
how did you survive the hit?"
"I don't know, it happened all too fast, but I remember feeling like I was full of energy at some point right after the crash"
"and can I please see your core again?"
"Sure"
The angel then opened himself, revealing the still damaged red sphere, but this time Samuel noticed something strange, that wasn't visible before because of the poor lighting in the vents.
And that strange thing was a set of blue lines shaped like lightnings that emerged from the edges of the cut in the core, which Hayden was sure he had seen somewhere else.
"Thank you I needed to see something that wasn't visible while in the vents"
"Oh right, can I remain there? My core hasn't healed yet and I need somewhere to rest"
"actually, if you want you can take the guest room that we have here, so it will also be easier to keep an eye on you.
Do you agree, Slayer, VEGA?"
"Yes"
"fine for me"
"Thank you! I'll go get my stuff"
And so the angel quickly flew back into the ventilation system and emerged backinto the room a minute later.
Like before, he was using his AT field to carry his stuff around and once he was back, Hayden started leading him towards his new quarters.
"That thing is so fucking CUTE nya!"
"Is there something you don't find cute glasses?" an annoyed Asuka asked and Mari replied "Not really, but I do know one thing that looks cute for you" "and that is?"
"The puppy! What else could it be?"
"MARI! He is not cute!" "He is super cute" she immediately thought after shouting at the other pilot, meanwhile Shinji had approached the Slayer to ask "Does he really find unit 01 that scary?"
"seems like it, right now he is a gold mine of information, but let's not stress him too much he needs some rest after almost dying"
"yeah, I think that I need some rest too after today's fight, I'm going back to my apartment, Asuka are you coming?"
"Later, now I need to teach Mari a lesson"
"don't use my old suits, I saw what happened last time" the Slayer told them, but he was unable to stop the catfight that had already started.
Guest room
"there we go, where did you get all of this stuff from anyway?"
Samuel asked after placing 'Ramiel's box of things' on the room's bed and the angel replied "just going around vents and taking it from around the ship, anyway, I wanted to really thank you for how nice you've all been to me"
"Well, the fact that the Slayer didn't shoot at you on sight is a miracle on its own, but hey, if you keep being nice and you don't attack us, then I don't see why we should attack you"
"Thanks" the angel then hugged Samuel with his field and once the robot replied the gesture, Ramiel said "you are very good at giving hugs"
Suddenly, VEGA called Hayden and said "Hayden, the people at NERV want to interrogate him on various topics, I suggest that you go there immediately as they seemed quite inpatient"
"Just one second and I'm coming VEGA" replied Ramiel, ending the hug and to this the Ai replied "I see you already know my name"
"yep, I heard it all the time, plus I think that we already talked to each other at some point, but I don't remember precisely"
"Hmmm interesting, the coincidences with the dream I had on Urdak are too many to be ignored, plus could this answer mean that he had the same dream too?
After all my core was still here on earth during the expedition, but from what I saw earlier he can't get too far away from his core, so there is no way he could have interacted with me, his interrogation will probably give more information, so for now I'll just wait…
In the meantime I might as well try to figure out how to fix his core as I don't want him to have another 'heart' attack"
A while later, both Ramiel, Hayden and the Slayer were traversing NERV's hallways, bringing their new guest to the interrogation.
Interrogation room
"Ok Fifth angel, can you hear me?"
Ritsuko asked and Ramiel responded "My name is Ramiel and yes I can hear you well"
"Ok, so let's begin, first question, why do the angels come to Tokyo 3?"
"Because we feel dad's presence in here and after fifteen years we all want to see him again"
"ok and what do you know about the second impact?"
"Oh, that day… I don't remember much from it, but from what I know, there were some people who were doing stuff with dad's body and at one point they hurt him a lot and he woke up very angry.
Then there was a lot of light and next me and my brothers were separated"
"how many angels are there?"
"Well I'm the fifth and if I remember correctly, if I count also mom and dad, there is a total of thirteen angels"
"So we still have to face five of them?"
"Yes and they are the strongest among us"
"that's not good"
"Well, I was the one with the strongest at field, so I think that you have a pretty fair chance at winning, although I don't know if I'm happy about it or not"
"ok… And tell us more about yourself, especially what happened after they crashed into you"
"my memory is still foggy, but I remember a lot of pain, then there was a lot of energy…
Ah yes! At one point something cut my core and left the scar that there is now, sometimes I hear voices come out of it.
This scar is also what is blocking my regeneration, but that's a good thing"
"really? Why?"
"Well I think that if I were able to get back to full strength, I would lose control and attack you guys again, but I don't want that, you are nice people"
"very well, now can you please tell us why the evangelion units 'scare you'?"
"not all of them, it's mostly the purple one because it feels like mom and she was always very bad with us, the others instead feel like dad"
"Fuck, that's a problem, if he can sense how the Evas are made, what other secrets that we have can he discover?"
"ok, I think that it's enough, we'll do this again tomorrow,same hour"
"okay, bye!" and so Ramiel flew out of the room followed by the Slayer.
"So, what do we make of this?" Hayden said and after seeing Misato's face he asked "hey, Misato, are you ok?"
"he's a kid"
"What?"
"they are all kids"
"Misato I'm not understanding you"
"I've dedicated a good part of my entire life just to get vengeance for what happened in Antarctica and now I discover that we've been killing kids who just want to see their parents!"
"Oh… It's okay Misato, he told us that he understands why we have to do this"
"No it's not okay"
And she then rushed out the room.
"What's the deal with her?" the robot asked and from the back Kaji emerged and said "it's about her past"
"Can I be filled in?"
"You see, her father was not a very caring person, he always dedicated his life to his job and he never spent time with Misato when she was little, so she began to hate him"
"But?"
"Well, in a cruel twist, the universe made it so that both Misato and her father were in Antarctica on the day of the second impact and just as Adam was awakened, her father gave his life to protect Misato by placing her in an escape pod.
She was the only survivor of that event and she was so struck by it that she didn't utter a word for a couple of years"
"it sounds like someone I know"
"you mean the Slayer?"
"Yes, you see, for a very long time he too had decided to remain silent, this was caused when the night sentinels were betrayed by a commander who made a pact with the demons,sealing them in hell.
It's there that the Slayer saw every one of his comrades and friends die at the hands of those beasts, leaving only him to endure the fight by himself.
For what I understand of it, he had chosen to remain silent because as long as the demons were around, they would hurt everyone that he got close with, so he just isolated himself completely so that no one would care for him enough to try and save him"
"damn,that's sad, at least now he seems to have gotten out of it"
"maybe, but even if this world is free of demons on the outside, he still has a lot of internal ones that he has to fight"
NERV corridors
"there we go, the portal is ready, let's go back Ramiel" the Slayer said and then the angel added "you know, one of the angels is very good at teleporting if I remember correctly, her name is Leliel"
"her?"
"yep, she always acted like a big sister to the rest of the angels, I like her"
"let's hope that she won't die too badly"
"actually, now that I think about it, there might be- wait do you hear this?"
"What? I'm not hearing anything"
"there is like, someone humming around here… Yeah it's coming from there, follow me"
"Wait a secon-"
The angel had already departed so the Slayer quickly started to follow him.
The small angel though was very fast, and because of NERV's small corridors, the Slayer couldn't run at his maximum speed, so after a while he lost him.
Moments later the Slayer saw a sign on the wall depicting where he was and it read "Evangelion cage unit 01" "oh fuck"
He thought and his worries came true when a couple of seconds later he heard Ramiel scream as loudly as he could.
When he reached the angel, he was hiding behind a box near the entrance of the cage, shaking in fear.
"Ramiel are you ok? What happened?"
"It's unit 01…It is awake and it was humming something and when I came in it moved and looked at me!"
"Woah hold on, the Evas can't move without the pilots, are you sure this is what happened?"
"Yes, I can bet my core on it"
"hold on I'll go check"
"... Be careful"
"What do you think it will do? Kill me? It can't , it isn't strong enough, now, come on, let's go in together to check again"
"What do you mean it isn't strong enough?" the angel asked while coming out of cover and the Slayer replied "you need something more powerful than an Eva to kill me, a lot more powerful"
And so the duo slowly walked into the cage and to their right, unit 01 was standing as still as ever, still Ramiel was very scared anyway.
"why are you scared now? It's deactivated"
"I'm hearing it breathe… it is just standing still right now"
"So there is something inside that armor"
The Slayer said while turning to look at the purple giant and then he continued "if what you are saying is true, then I believe that it's going to remain like this the entire time we are here and even later.
Come on now, let's go back to the ship"
"Y-yes!"
Once the two were out of the room, the unit's eyes lit up again and the song it was humming resumed.
What it wasn't aware of though was that VEGA could hear this song and that he had been following the fifth angel everywhere since he was discovered.
So the Ai decided to test something and after quickly gaining control of the cage, he lowered the entry plug, but without opening the back of the Eva so that it would only poke it on its back.
The result of this was kind of expected.
Once the entry plug hit the armor, the song immediately stopped, but what happened next surprised even the God ai.
As the plug returned to its original position, the head of the Eva turned towards the camera from which VEGA was looking and for a split second, the image of a woman appeared on the feed and so VEGA asked no one in particular "what are you?"
And the unit replied.
In fact after the question, hei received a transmission from the MAGI which said that it was sent by the unit itself.
It was coded and after VEGA made it readable, the only things that were left were a name and a surname.
"Yui Ikari"
"Very well…Yui, I'll keep an eye on you"
After this the Ai disconnected with the room, to return to the Fortress of Doom where Hayden and the Slayer were talking about the progress on the repairs to the ship's engines.
Fortress of Doom, main hall
"So, we'll do a test tomorrow?" the Slayer asked and Hayden replied
"yes, they are basically ready to go, I just need to finish checking some values and then this thing will be able to fly again"
"Good, we might be able to use it against the angels too, especially since the shield is so powerful.
Also I believe that there are some bits of Ramiel still under us don't you think?"
"Well considering that there are some spikes that come out of the ground right next to the ship, I don't think that it's too far fetched, we might even be able to find the rest of the core"
"I don't think so, he said that while his mass persists, the remains of the core are gone, but he also said that if he gets his regeneration back he'll be able to make it return to normal"
"do we really want that?"
Samuel asked and this time he was answered by VEGA who said "I believe that we should try, plus thanks to extensive analysis of the core, I am close to being able to create an object which will limit his internal activity, thus silencing his angelic instincts"
To this Hayden replied "You never quit to surprise us fa- VEGA"
Then the Slayer asked "Also, how are the boosters for the units coming along?"
"they should be finished soon too, the design is almost complete and thanks to Akagi, we have learned how to convey the energy of the AT field into a propulsion force.
If everything goes well they will be ready in two days"
"great, I'm going to my room now, in a couple of hours I'll have to go finish 'upgrading' terminal dogma, see you later guys"
"later Slayer" they both said and with that everyone returned to what they were doing before the meeting and for VEGA, it was trying to communicate further with the units.
EVA cages
"nothing, no signals from either unit 00 and 03, so that leaves me with the corrupt data from unit 02 and unit 01… now, who is this Yui ikari it told me about?"
As he said that he opened NERV's files and after searching the name, only a single result came back while the rest seemed to have been deleted from the system.
It spoke about the wife of NERV's commander and mother of Shinji, Yui Ikari.
It spoke about her discoveries in Eva technology, her career and about her personal life.
What surprised the Ai the most though, was when he reached the part where it spoke about her death and it read
"Died during the contact test with unit 01.
Because of the very high synchronization rates with the core, the body dissolved inside the entry plug and turned into LCL.
An attempt was made to recover her from the core of the unit, but it was unsuccessful.
That day she was declared deceased and after this, upon direct order by the commander, all documents and illustrations containing her have been removed except this one" end document.
VEGA was seriously taken back by this as it both explained a lot and it created a lot more questions.
He then started thinking on a way to communicate with the core directly, so he tried using the same 'telepathic' technique, but this time an orange wall blocked his entrance so after a while of trying he stopped and told the Eva "you have an interesting story Yui, I would like to talk"
He then received a new encrypted message which read "can't talk too much, or I am discovered. Keep secret?"
"huh, I guess that there are some things that we still don't know, ok, I'll stay silent, just remember that I can keep an eye out for you at all times. Take care of Shinji"
And with that VEGA left the room,satisfied with the results.
Fortress of Doom, Guest room
"Do you like it Ramiel?"
"this room is fantastic. Thank you Hayden"
"No problem, I have to go work on the engines now so stay here and don't destroy anything ok?"
"don't worry, my AT field isn't that strong… yet"
"What do you mean yet?"
"tomorrow when you'll get the ship back up again, there is a large part of me that is under it so when we'll fly I will absorb it and become more powerful.
Though I fear that I might lose control of myself when that happens"
"we'll bring the Evas out just to be sure, plus VEGA is making a device that will allow you to keep control even if you get back to full power, but he needs to scan your core for more information, you can just remain here with it exposed and there should be no problems"
"ok thank you"
And so, after Hayden left the room, the angel moved his core out of his body and placed it on the bed next to him.
Moments later a camera was activated and it started shining a blue light on the sphere while it was analyzing various parameters.
After a while, VEGA, to break the silence asked "are you enjoying yourself Ramiel?"
"Yes, I need to thank you a lot for, well… Not killing me"
"I can't say that decision was unanimous though, especially in Katsuragi's case"
"isn't she the one with purple hair?"
"correct.
You see, she was at the epicenter of the second impact and on that day she lost her father because of the explosion.
From then she was sworn to taking revenge on the angels, but seeing your new 'situation' has definitely shook her.
Now she considers killing angels the same as killing human children because of how you are acting"
"Oh, I'm sad about it, but I'm not a kid! I'm more than sixty million years old!"
"Really? When were you born?"
"I don't remember much, but there were some big things that looked like lizards and very strange animals, but after dad and mom reached this planet they were gone…
Actually that was five million years before I was born, so I'm the fifth angel, we are numbered based on that"
"So the last one is also the youngest?"
"Yes, but also the most intelligent, since he had more time to evolve"
"What was it like at the time?"
"not the best… You see we couldn't go around the planet because of our parents"
"What do you mean?"
"dad always told us that they were never supposed to reach the same planet, for some reason I don't understand, but it happened.
Dad also told us that in case this happened there were two weapons that would activate and would put to sleep both him and mom.
But mom's one was broken when she landed so only dad's one activated, imprisoning him and sealing us inside of his body, where we spent the entire time together.
So, since mom was left alone, she started to create life on this planet, including the lilim"
"I understand, but why do you keep calling humans 'lilim'?"
"because my mom's name is Lilith so since they are born from her we call them lilim"
"oh"
Silence then filled the room once again, but not for long as a couple of minutes later the scanner emitted a sound, indicating that it was finished and that it had found what VEGA was searching for so the Ai said "I'm done here, you can put your core back in, thank you for waiting"
"No problem… Hey can I ask you something?"
"Yes"
"Can I play with the toys again?"
"you'll have to ask the Slayer for that but I think that he will agree"
"Yay!"
Ramiel then quickly left the room to reach the Slayer's quarters, but on his way there he stopped as he heard something calling him and he felt strangely inclined to go to another part of the ship.
With some struggle though, Ramiel shut the voice out and resumed his previous destination.
Meanwhile VEGA, who had seen this happen, thought
"oh no, it's already taking effect…
I'll need to speed up the production of the Argent limitator or we won't be able to stop him"
And so he diverted most of the ship's power towards the special 3d printer that he was using to create the device so that it could be ready by tomorrow morning.
As he did this he thought "please Ramiel, I need you to resist their call just for a couple more hours"
TO BE CONTINUED- (in part 2)